How You Can Make the World a Better Place — Right Now

Through a single act of kindness, each person has their moods improved until everyone in the world is positively touched.

A couple of days ago I was in a public restroom in a park. All over the Bathroom, especially around the waste paper basket, were used paper towels, likely thrown toward the trash receptacle but didn’t make it in, or were carelessly thrown on the floor after someone washed his hands.

I found myself thinking about my mother, who many years ago told me that one of her life practices was to pick up the strewn paper towels in public restrooms as a way to tidy the bathroom for the next person who comes. She said she wipes down the counter, too, making it look better.

Thinking about that, my attention turned to the subject of simple, kind acts people can do. I believe opportunities to complete them are being made available to us all the time, and I mean that literally. There is ALWAYS a kind thing we can be doing, even if it involves a thought.

I proceeded to tidy up the bathroom.

In many ways this was a small action. No one saw me do it and it didn’t take much effort.

But maybe it wasn’t so small, after all.

Perhaps the next person in that public restroom felt just a tiny bit better for having a clean bathroom to use than he would had the bathroom been a mess. He exited the bathroom and moved on to his next event in life in a better mood, treating everyone he encountered a tiny bit better.

Thinking this way, I go on to think that that ripple extended further, that those people positively impacted by the man who encountered a clean public restroom were also nicer to others than they otherwise would have been.

Treated nicer, each person on down the line had their Moods Improved, and so on and so on and so on until everyone in the world was touched.

I don’t think that’s such a ridiculous consideration. It’s also how powerful I think we are, and it can start with the simplest of acts.

Like tidying up a public restroom.

(This article is part of my work to promote ordinary acts of kindness. Learn more at https://kindliving.net.)

We All Have a Superpower — To Do Positive Things was originally published in The Ascent on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.